Koshur Kagaz: The lost industry

If you require a single leaf of handmade paper, you will get it from anywhere, but not at least in Jammu and Kashmir. In fact it is not nowadays manufactured anywhere in this land.

You will find the leaves of handmade paper in Rajasthan and Karnataka, but nowhere in Kashmir where once it was manufactured in bulk and exported to other places.

You will definitely find the written samples of Kashmiri hand in the museums and manuscript collections of other states of India, Pakistan and China. You will come across the handwritten manuscripts and paintings of Kashmiri handmade paper even in European royal museums and libraries.

Preparing the paper sheets

The museums, research libraries, archival repositories, and few Muslim shrines, khanqahs, Hindu temples, Buddhist stupas, Sikh Gurdawaras, and manuscript collections of Jammu, Kashmir and Ladakh house thousands of manuscripts, files and paintings made in Kashmiri handmade paper. But in the book and stationary marts of Srinagar and Jammu, you will never find a single leaf of this product.

Perhaps very few people of this new generation know that in olden times, besides China, it was Kashmir which got the first paper industry and supplied paper to other states of the then undivided India.

This paper was locally called Kagaz and the manufacturers associated with this industry were known Kagazgar, the paper manufacturer. This was basically a domestic industry which not only fulfilled the local needs but also exported this locally made paper to the entire subcontinent.

Drying the manufactured sheets

History reveals that when people of other lands used to write on stones and rocks, Kashmiris wrote on the local paper called ‘Koshur Kagaz’. They had discovered it very early and had been providing it to the people in the plains of undivided India. Many traditional domestic paper industrial units functioned in the valley which that produced the local paper to its writers.

This industry had got many major and small units located in its various stream banks, like its water pulled flour mills. Two of its major units once existed, one at Ganderbal and another at Nowshehra, area of Srinager district and these units were functional till late Dogra period. The locality of Nowshera where units of this industry had been setup still has preserved its name and is called Kazgari Mohalla

The industry is said to have been introduced by Sultan Zain-ul Abiden in 14th century AD. He is believed to have invited paper masters from Samarkand and provided those large jagirs to settle in Kashmir and encouraged them to cultivate proper production industry. George Forester who arrived here during Afghan rule says, “Kashmir fabricated the best writing paper of the land and that it was an article of extensive traffic.”

Paper sheets are ready

The manufacturing of the paper suggested that the handmade paper was produced of pulp which was a mixture of rugs and hemps. It was obtained by pounding those materials under a lever mill worked by a water power lime and some kind of soda was used to whiten the pulp.

Sir water Lawrence, in his monumental book The Valley of Kashmir provides a brief description of that paper making method. He writes; the pulp is placed in stone troughs, baths and mixed with water. From this mixture this layer of the pulp is extracted on a light and dried in sun, then it is polished with pumice stone and then its surface is glazed with rice water. A final polishing with stone is given and the paper is then ready for use.

This traditional industry produced variety of paper stocks; in rough and smooth fabrics in golden, silver, grey, cream and white colours. Usually for general writings rough fabric paper was used while for valuable writings soft fabric paper was used. In writing of the religious scripts usually golden and silver paper with shining fabric was used.

The Kashmiri paper was durable. It was in great demand in Punjab plains and in other hilly principalities of the north western regions.

Scribes writing on Kashmiri handmade paper sheets

Almost all ancient manuscripts, documents, files, judicial papers and currency notes available up to 19th century AD are written in variety of this paper in exquisite calligraphy designs. The manuscripts included the history, cultural, religious, medical, astronomical, and mathematical and other literary texts.

These manuscripts are written in Sharda, Persian and Arabic languages and numerals. Although now a days we cannot find any such paper industry here but evidences of this paper are available in the shape of olden manuscripts and files, in Kashmir museums and repositories

Unfortunately we lost this glorious domestic paper industry during the early decades of 20th century AD. It was destroyed by expansion of Indian mill paper industry, as it had no such capacity to meet growing demands of the large paper requirements. No traces of handmade paper industry are left anywhere now. The state authorities could not help even in preserving the traditional equipments of its local paper industry. The state museum, cultural academy, research libraries and private collectors have been housing the last evidences of manuscripts of handmade paper but neither equipment nor the paper preparation methods are illustrated anywhere. In fact today’s people have no idea of the glorious industry that existed here even before the people of the sub continent were aware of this trade.

Olden currency notes made in Kashmir handmade paper

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this article are the personal opinions of the author.

The facts, analysis, assumptions and perspective appearing in the article do not reflect the views of GK.